Should You Go Here: The Museum of Toilets

By Audrey Farnsworth

Should you go here? Glad you asked. I’ll dig deep, and ask questions like: What is this place? What is happening here? Do I like this? Will YOU like this? Should anyone go to this place? Should this place cease to exist??? Let’s find out.

THE MUSEUM OF TOILETS

Where is this?

New Delhi, India

Sulabh International Museum of Toilets

What is this?

The Sulabh International Museum of Toilets is a museum about …well, it’s a museum about toilets. Toilets of all kinds. Old toilets, new toilets, mostly just the old toilets though, lots and lots of old as hell toilets. You can see what people used as toilets in ancient civilizations (Egypt! Babylon! Greece! Others!), during the Middle Ages, you name it, they got the toilets, dude. They’ve got kings’ toilets, emperors’ toilets, modern toilets. They’ve even got a model of the world’s biggest toilet complex.

They’ve got a model of another toilet-themed place at this toilet-themed place?

Correct.

Why does this exist?

Because it’s creator, Dr. Bindeshwar Pathak, thought that the world needed a museum to commemorate toilets and how important they are to civilization. Which I mean, I gotta hand it to him, he’s not wrong! They are important. And now, at last, you can learn all about them here, with his rare collection of facts and photos of toilets and toilet-related items. There is also a collection of (and I quote), “beautiful poems related to the toilet and its usage.”

There are toilet…poems?

There are toilet poems at the toilet museum, correct.

And what is happening here?

People are learning about the history of hygiene and sanitation, as well as looking at old toilets, and reading poems about toilets in a museum specifically about toilets.

Sulabh International Museum of Toilets

Why would someone go to this?

Oh, I don’t know, maybe because they enjoy learning? Or history? If you enjoy learning, and history, and specifically learning about the history of toilets, you would enjoy the Toilet Museum, probably. Or maybe you’re renovating your home’s bathroom and need inspiration. I don’t know! I’m not you!

Would you go to this?

Yeah, I guess so. Why not? I mean, I appreciate toilets as much as the next guy (so, a lot? I guess?) but I’m not super interested in seeing every toilet that’s ever existed. But, hey, I’d gladly walk right the heck in there and read some toilet facts, sure, and even more importantly, read some toilet poems.

Okay, so, out of curiosity… other than this toilet museum, and the OTHER aforementioned toilet-themed place they have a model of inside of this museum, are there any other toilet-themed places in the world that we should know about?.

Great news–there are more! In fact, if this museum is too vanilla for you, and you’re like, “Hmm, I want to go somewhere toilet-themed, but I’d prefer it to be absolutely nuts,” you could travel on over to South Korea, to this other toilet-themed place, a toilet-themed Park, in fact, called Mr. Toilet House. It’s less of a museum to “learn actual facts at” and more of a “completely bonkers toilet-themed madhouse, with toilet shaped buildings.”

Shutterstock

Please elaborate.

Gladly. Mr. Toilet House (actual name) was established as a place of “physical and mental rest”–it’s a theme park dedicated to toilets, and their importance, and has various different toilet-themed exhibitions through the year, such as a children’s festival called “Dream & Poop World” (??) and “Poop! Save Our Earth!” (???) The mayor of Suwon City himself wrote a letter for their website (??????), and foresees it becoming a “major tourist attraction.” It originated from founder Sim Jae-duck (who was born in a toilet–I’m not making this up) “destroying his house where he lived for 30 years” and “building a house that looked like a toilet to celebrate the birth of the World Toilet Association.”